


Falling

by AntarcticBird



Category: Glee
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-22
Updated: 2014-09-22
Packaged: 2018-02-18 09:51:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2344115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AntarcticBird/pseuds/AntarcticBird
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the prompt: “I wish you would notice me and maybe develop feelings for me.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Falling

The first thing Blaine decides he likes about college is his roommate.

Kurt is awesome. He’s smart and funny and kind and so stunningly, breathtakingly beautiful that every time Blaine tries talking to him, all that comes out of his mouth is either a garbled mess of unconnected sounds or something so idiotic he blushes all the way to the roots of his hair. But Kurt always just smiles at him, that cute, gentle smile of his, and walks away.

Kurt is awesome, but the truth is, they aren’t friends. (Yet, Blaine promises himself.)

Blaine has friends. He’s not always a complete disaster when he’s around other people. It’s Kurt, quite specifically, who turns him from a charming (he hopes), smiling (usually), popular (or at least well-liked by his friends) college freshman into a bumbling, clumsy idiot who walks into walls, trips over his own shoelaces, spills soda down his shirt and drops whatever he’s holding in his hands whenever Kurt addresses him. It’s humiliating, but he can’t help it, and amidst all the embarrassment, he has grown kind of addicted to the way his heart lurches when Kurt walks through the door, the way his palms tingle when Kurt asks him to hand him something that’s closer to his side of the room.

He has always liked being in love, even if it’s never been quite like this before - he’s into big gestures, being open, being honest, standing in front of the person he loves with his warm, beating heart in his hands and offering it up to them without a second thought.

Around Kurt, he counts it a good day when he doesn’t fall out of bed with his cheek catching on the edge of the nightstand and leaving him with a scratch so deep Kurt had had to rush for the first aid kit before Blaine could bleed all over the carpet. All because Kurt had called out a harmless “good morning” across the room while still in boxers and with his hair sticking up adorably in the back. There is not even the thought of big gestures in this case, not until he learns to not hurt himself every time Kurt speaks to him.

Kurt has friends too. And for the first few weeks of them living together, he keeps inviting Blaine along when he goes out with them, and Blaine wants to go, he does. He wants to sit next to Kurt at lunch and he wants to go to karaoke at night and playfully slap at Kurt’s fingers when he tries to steal food off of his plate. The thing is, he doesn’t know how. So he keeps making up excuses (when he actually manages to master the basic requirements of the English language), and anyway, Kurt was probably never serious about them hanging out in the first place.

They get along well enough as roommates; there are no weird habits to get used to, no wild parties in their room, and as far as Blaine knows Kurt never has any … boyfriends over. He knows Kurt goes on dates, and he envies those guys so much he can’t breathe, and the fact that none of them seem to want to stick around ever is the greatest mystery in the world to him. (Or maybe, he thinks, it’s Kurt who doesn’t want to go out with them again. But he’s still angry even through his jealousy, because Kurt is wonderful and those guys are clearly idiots.)

But yes, generally speaking, not counting Blaine’s spontaneous IQ-drop every time Kurt opens his mouth or even just blinks in his direction, they do get along very well.

Which is why it comes as a bit of a surprise when Kurt enters the room one day, crosses the carpet to Blaine’s bed, and gently sits down next to him, looking worried. “Blaine,” he says. “If you want to request a new roommate I won’t hold it against you. No hard feelings. I just thought you should know.”

Blaine looks up from his book, too stunned to speak for a moment. “Uh,” he says, scrambling for the right words, willing them to make sense in his head. “What?”

Kurt shrugs, biting his lip, looking very uncomfortable. “I mean, it’s no big deal. I get it. Well, I don’t, not really, but you’re actually a nice guy and I don’t think I’ve actively done anything to make you uncomfortable. And I think you’re trying, but I can’t change who I am, and if you need - I don’t know. If you can’t share a room with me, I think it’s better if we just end this now. Wouldn’t you agree?”

“I - um.” Blaine clears his throat, desperately trying to follow, but he has the feeling that even without his Kurt-induced stupidity he wouldn’t be able to right now. “What are you - I mean, I don’t -”

“You’re not the first guy I’ve lived with who had a problem with me being gay,” Kurt says with a bitter, sad little grin that looks so defeated it hurts Blaine’s heart to see it. “If it means anything, you’ve been a lot nicer about it than he was.”

Blaine shakes his head, confused, so lost in this moment, all he knows is that he wants to make Kurt feel better, because seriously, Kurt thinks he’s what, homophobic? The realization hits him suddenly and he laughs out loud, he can’t help it, it just bursts out of him.

Kurt looks actually hurt now. “Wow, okay,” he says. “Well, I tried.”

“Me too,” Blaine blurts, and Kurt gives him a cold look.

“I actually don’t think what you did qualifies as -”

“No,” Blaine interrupts, holding up a hand, frowning through the remnants of laughter to sort through the thoughts that are important right now. “I mean. Gay. Me. I am. Gay. One hundred percent. Always have been. Like, really, really gay. Like, it’s not that I don’t like girls, they’re nice and all, my best friend is a girl, it’s just I don’t like them like that. I like guys. As in: I only think about guys. Well, I don’t only think about guys, I just - Well, not guys anyway, not plural. Just - a guy, just the one, I mean, I knew even before, I knew since I was twelve, but lately there’s been - oh god,” he breaks off, mortified. “Please stop me.”

Kurt looks utterly lost for a second, before a small grin twitches the corners of his mouth. “So I guess you’re not homophobic, then.”

Blaine shakes his head so hard he feels dizzy from it. “No! No, god no. No.”

“No?” Kurt asks, and his tone is teasing now, but with an undertone that makes Blaine feel warm all over. “Well. I’m glad we cleared that up.”

“Yeah, I too, I mean, me too, I mean -” Blaine sighs in frustration, feels the blush rising high on his cheeks. “I’m glad too. I can’t believe you thought I was -”

“It seemed to be the most likely explanation,” Kurt says, shrugging. “I’m so sorry for jumping to conclusions. I just - I assumed because you were sort of distant and never wanted to hang out - that was presumptuous of me. I’m sorry. We don’t have to be friends.”

“Can we though?” The words are out before he can stop them, and his face feels like it’s on fire. “Uh. Can we be friends? If I promise to stop being so - well, if I promise to be more like -”

“Blaine,” Kurt says, and his smile looks genuinely happy. “We can be friends without you promising to be anyone else.”

“Oh.” Blaine smiles back at him, and hey, they’re having an actual conversation. “Good.”

“Oh my god,” Kurt breathes, relief in his voice. “I sat in the library for an hour talking myself into talking to you. I was so sure this would turn into a fight or one of those super awkward conversations.” He bumps their shoulders together gently. “I’m glad I was wrong.”

“Yeah,” Blaine breathes, and he can’t look away, Kurt is so close and he smells so good and he’s warm and oh god he’s so helplessly, hopelessly in love he feels weak with it -

“So, new friend,” Kurt says, patting his knee lightly. “I’m getting lunch. Do you want to join me?”

“Oh, um.” He swallows, looking away. And he’s grateful that Kurt is being so nice, but he’s sure Kurt wants to hang out with his friends without his idiot of a roommate cramping his style. “Thanks, I’m good,” he says.

Kurt frowns. “So you’ve had lunch already?”

“Uh. No.”

“You don’t eat lunch?” Kurt tries.

“No, I do. But you probably had plans and I -”

“Okay.” Kurt turns toward him, tucking one leg under himself on Blaine’s bed so he can fully face him. “Let’s try this again.” He takes a breath, meeting Blaine’s eyes, and god it’s difficult not to look away. “Blaine?”

“Yes?” he replies obediently.

Kurt smiles. “It just so happens that I have absolutely no plans for lunch. Which is why I thought I might ask a friend to join me. Eating alone sucks. So, would you please have lunch with me?”

Blaine laughs, just a short and sort of squeaky laugh that’s a little embarrassing, but it makes Kurt’s eyes light up, so he counts it a win. “Okay, if you’re sure.”

“Yeah, Blaine, I’m sure,” Kurt tells him, getting up off the bed with a final pat to Blaine’s thigh to walk over to his chair, picking up his discarded jacket.

Blaine sucks in a breath as soon as Kurt’s back is turned, slapping his hands in front of his eyes. His face is burning but underneath that all he feels is happy. They’ve talked. And he hasn’t thrown up on Kurt and he hasn’t hit himself in the face mid-gesture and he hasn’t just stared like a love-struck idiot. They’ve actually talked. He can’t believe it.

“I just have to go to the bathroom real quick and then -” Kurt tells him, and Blaine doesn’t look up, keeps his hands firmly in front of his face. He just - needs a moment.

There’s the click of a door and he feels the breath leave his lungs, slumps forward a little with the realization that he’s alone in the room for a few minutes. And then Kurt will come back and they’ll have lunch and oh god, oh god, it could so easily be a date, he wants so badly to go on a date with Kurt, but they should have lunch first, they only just started being friends - And yet he can’t help how he feels, and now in private it just bubbles up inside of him, the thing he wished he could have said to Kurt when he’d asked him to be friends.

“I like you so much,” he mumbles into his hands. “God Kurt - I wish you would notice me and maybe develop feelings for me. Ugh, I’m such an idiot -"

“Um, what?” comes the reply from not three feet away, and Blaine - freezes.

Carefully, very carefully, he spreads his fingers in front of his eyes, squinting across the room to where Kurt is standing, scarf wrapped half around his neck, and his hand on the - oh. Oh. It hadn’t been the door to their room, Blaine notices somewhat belatedly. That click had merely been Kurt opening and closing the closet door to get his scarf.

“Oh my god,” Blaine groans, and if he’d been blushing before, now he feels like he wants to sink through the floor. “Oh my -”

“Is that true?” Kurt asks, and he looks stunned, something tentative, vaguely hopeful flickering around the corners of his eyes.

Blaine - gives up. He cannot be more humiliated than he already is, and there’s no use denying it anymore. He knows Kurt had heard him. “I’m sorry,” he says. “This is awkward. We can still request new roommates, I’m sorry -”

“No,” Kurt breathes, a slow smile spreading across his face. “I like the roommate I’ve got.”

“Really?” Blaine asks. “Still? Even though I just said -”

“Blaine,” Kurt interrupts. “Listen to me. I _like_ you. Okay?”

His heart jumps painfully once, then hammers away against his ribcage so loudly he thinks he could make a career as a live drum set if Kurt sticks around long enough. “You mean -”

Kurt nods, blushing a little, and it’s the most adorable, endearing thing Blaine has ever seen. “Yeah.”

“But you never said anything,” Blaine points out, still somewhat disbelieving, oh god, this is too good, this can’t be happening to him, this is Kurt, perfect, beautiful, amazing Kurt…

“Well, I kind of thought you hated me,” Kurt reminds him.

“Oh.” Blaine nods, and he can’t stop the grin anymore, this is the best day ever even if he’d had to go through hell to get here. “Yeah. I don’t.”

“I know that now.”

“I’m so sorry that I made you think - I’m not usually this … weird, I’m just, you’re just -”

“Blaine?” Kurt asks, and Blaine looks up, stops rambling.

“Yeah?”

“Lunch?”

“Okay.”

He climbs off the bed, only almost slipping once, biting his tongue when he stubs his toe against the nightstand in his haste to get to Kurt.

“You all right?” Kurt asks, amused, as Blaine hop-steps across the room to keep the weight off his stubbed toe, overbalancing at the sound of Kurt’s voice and almost colliding head-first with the closet door. Kurt catches him last minute, laughing loudly, happily. “Careful!”

Blaine glares at him. “It’s all your fault anyway. This never happens when you’re not around.”

Kurt tilts his head, smirking, but at least has the decency to blush. “Yeah I - I figured,” he says. “I mean, my friend Rachel - you know Rachel? She’s in Cassy July’s dance class with you and she says you’re quite good -”

“Really?”

“I believe the words she used was graceful as a gazelle and hot as a volcano.”

Blaine straightens his shoulders, pleased. “Promise me one thing?”

“What?”

“Never take the same dance class with me. I can’t afford my grades slipping like that.”

Kurt giggles. “Deal. If you let me pay for your lunch.”

“You mean like on a date?” Blaine asks, biting his lip and wincing as soon as the words are out.

Kurt lowers his head to hide his smile, brushes his fingers down Blaine’s arm. “Yeah,” he whispers. “Like on a date. If that’s okay?”

**

That night once they’re both done with their homework, Kurt tries to kiss him and Blaine slips on a discarded piece of paper that hadn’t quite made it all the way to the trash can and ends up sprawled on his back, staring up at the ceiling, blinking away the shock of first Kurt’s lips and then the fall.

Kurt kneels down next to him, all concerned and fussing over him at first, but Blaine really is okay, only his ego a bit bruised and even that is hardly important when Kurt looks at him with so much affection in his eyes.

They make out on the floor until their lips are sore and Blaine thinks that, not now, not yet, but someday soon, he’ll have regained enough of his usual charm and composure around Kurt to start thinking about one of those grand gestures he’s so fond of. He already has a million ideas.


End file.
